


Delicate Pleasures

by DoreyG



Category: Justice League & Justice League Unlimited (Cartoons), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Crossover, Dating, Flirting, Getting Together, Gossip, M/M, Secret Identity Fail, Wally West is a Compulsive Gossip and Nobody Will COrrect Me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-18
Updated: 2015-11-18
Packaged: 2018-05-02 06:34:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5238083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/pseuds/DoreyG
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Later, Wally will accuse it of being a meet cute. At the time, doubled over and gasping, it felt less cute and more <i>painful</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Delicate Pleasures

They met for the first time in the park. Although, well… Perhaps met was too kind a term. He was chasing after Wally, Sam was chasing after Steve. They collided in the middle, chest to chest, so hard that the air was forced out of both of them and they had to stagger back to reclaim it.

Later, Wally will accuse it of being a meet cute. At the time, doubled over and gasping, it felt less cute and more _painful_.

“Sorry,” Sam was the first to speak, straightening up with an expression that was only slightly pained, “sorry, man, I didn’t see you there. I was just following my friend, and… Well, yeah. Are you alright?”

“Takes more than that to phase me,” he grinned, only a touch breathlessly, and straightened up. Allowed his eyes to take in the man – his well-defined shoulders, his obvious athleticism, the incredibly apologetic look on his face, “it was my fault too, _my_ friend has the tendency to run off when he gets excited and… Well, somebody has to fetch him.”

“Tell me about it,” Sam laughed, shook his head. He had a nice laugh, it made him look a lot younger somehow, “I wouldn’t exactly describe my guy as excitable, but it still feels like I spend half of my life running after him. It’s a miracle that I get any sleep, with the way he goes on.”

“I know the feeling,” he chuckled, thrilled to find a kindred spirit. Because he loved Wally, he really did, but god _damn_ was the kid exhausting sometimes, “I’m John, by the way. John Stewart.”

“Sam Wilson, pleased to meet you,” Sam smiled, and extended a hand to shake. His skin was just slightly calloused, his eyes warm when he smiled, “look, this is going to sound like a really odd question. But are you an army man?”

“Former marine,” he said proudly, and blinked a little as Sam beamed at him – in his defence, it had been an alarmingly attractive beam, “what, are you…?”

“Former Air Force,” Sam grinned, just as proudly, and then reluctantly glanced down at the beep of his phone, “Pararescue, to be exact… And this is telling me that I need to actually find my friend, and get going. Sorry about that. We should try to meet up again, alright? From the sounds of it, we have a _lot_ we could talk about.”

 

\--

 

“We have _got_ to stop meeting like this,” Sam grinned, the next time they bumped into each other.

It was two weeks later, in a different park across town, and to be entirely accurate they hadn’t really bumped into each other that time. They had briefly brushed by each other while heading in opposite directions, his ring had helpfully nudged him and he had waved his hello. It was all an accident, really, a quirk of fate.

A happy accident, a _great_ quirk of fate he started to realize as he smiled into Sam’s face, “chasing your guy again?”

“My girl this time, actually,” Sam laughed when he saw his face, which had obviously registered his brief disappointment loud and clear, and shook his head, “not like _that_. Nat’s a friend. And, between you and me, far too terrifying to be anything else.”

“I know a few women like that,” he chuckled fondly, shaking his head over the memories, “Diana, Shayera. Hell, the stories I could tell…”

“I gotta run, unfortunately. Nat doesn’t like to be kept waiting,” Sam kindly interrupted, before the memories – of Shayera with her flame red hair, Shayera soaring laughing into the sky, the look on Shayera’s face when she betrayed them – could turn miserable, “but, hey, give me your number. I was thinking that we should go out to dinner some time, if you want. Talk about the army, the terrifying women we know, the unfairly fast friends we both seem to have…”

“That sounds great,” he found himself grinning, pulling out his phone without really thinking about it, “beyond great, actually. Absolutely… Fantastic.”

Later, when he catches up, Wally asks him why he’s smiling like he’s just won the Super Bowl. He only chuckles, shakes his head, and keeps grinning like a fool as he drags the man all the way back to the Watchtower.

 

\--

 

Unfortunately the next time they met, it wasn’t in the park.

“ _You’re_ the Falcon?” He demanded angrily, as he shot a rather blue and vicious looking alien out of the sky, “one of the most prominent allies of Captain America? New member of the Avengers?”

“ _You’re_ the Green Lantern?” Sam frowned in reply, looking more confused than anything as he swooped up to kick yet another threat out of the sky, “space cop extraordinaire? Founding member of the Justice League?”

It was a rare joint venture, between the Avengers and the Justice League. A sudden alien invasion, vicious blue things falling from the sky, and a team up was decided as the best possible option. He couldn’t argue with the logic of it, right up to the point where the guy that he’d been flirting with in various parks dropped out of the sky and turned out to be yet another daring superhero with wings.

And he wanted to remain angry, he really did because _seriously_ , but at that thought he just had to smile. Wally had teased him about having a type before, and he had always shook it off but now… “In my defence, I honestly thought you knew. I mean, it’s not like I wear a mask or anything.”

“I, uh, Don’t watch the news much. Too down on Veterans, you know?” Sam smiled down at him tentatively, apologetically. And he decided, quite suddenly, that they could most definitely work with that, “and, in _my_ defence, I honestly thought that you knew too. I mean, I was only chasing after Steve Rogers. The most famous soldier on the earth, adorner of the vast majority of childhood bedrooms…”

“I was a bit distracted by a certain red blur at the time,” he offered wryly, casually stabbed sideways with the ring to drive aside an entire hoard of blue monsters, “sorry about that. Hey, if you don’t mind me asking, what are you doing tomorrow night?”

“Assuming we survive this…” Sam sighed, and they both laughed in time. It felt warmer than he thought it would, “eh, probably just renting a movie and chilling out after yet another attempted alien invasion. Unless you’ve got a far better suggestion, of course?”

“Well, I know this great Chinese place on my block…”

Later, Diana will tease him about getting a number mid battle while Bruce glowers over her shoulder. And yet again, he’ll be unable to stop grinning as he teases her right back.

\--

 

“I’m so glad I’m not the only one who thinks that!”

“It _is_ weird,” he laughed, glass of wine in his hand and surprisingly warm buzz in his belly, “I mean, all the planets in the universe and yet…”

“The aliens always seem to pick Earth,” Sam snorted, shook his head. He had a remarkably attractive smile, he was starting to notice it more and more often, “I mean, and I love earth don’t get me wrong – but they could go absolutely _anywhere_ , anywhere at all, and yet they always choose this incredibly well defended planet.”

“And usually America.”

“And usually America!” Sam laughed, threw his arms wide. He also had an incredibly attractive laugh, one that he was sure could prove thoroughly distracting in a variety of situations, “I mean, god. I know that we’re definitely not actually the greatest nation on earth-“

“Don’t say that too loudly,” he grinned, took another sip of his wine, “you don’t want Captain America himself to jump through the window.”

“-But we _must_ have the highest concentration of superheroes,” Sam only carried on, sending him a glance that hovered just on the edge of fond, “I mean, you think you’d have learned that maybe landing in the Australian outback would be a better idea by now. But _nope_.”

“That would be too easy,” he snorted. And hesitated for a long second before leaning forward to rest his elbows upon the table, “you know, I’m glad we finally managed to do this. It’s been a surprising amount of fun.”

“A surprising amount of fun?” Sam teased, but with a charmingly gentle light in his eyes, “oh, am I that terrifying?”

“It’s definitely not you, it’s just…” He bit his lip, sighed out through his nose for a moment. Was surprised, when Sam actually reached out across the table and covered his hand with his own, “You’ve heard what happened with Hawkgirl, right? As much as I hate to admit it, I’ve not had the best track record with this kind of thing lately and-“

“And you were worried that it’d hang over this,” Sam said, eyes alive with sympathy.

“Yes, _exactly_.”

“I get that,” Sam nodded quietly, and then sent him a grin so bright that everything suddenly became right again. Better than right, shining and lovely in a way sudden enough to stun, “and so I can assure you that it honestly hasn’t, and it honestly won’t. I really like you, okay? And I’m willing to work through just about anything, to see where this leads.”

He grinned in response, just a touch helplessly. And watched the bright smile spread over Sam’s face in reply.

 

\--

 

“Please tell me that the world is ending,” he snapped, the moment he opened the door to see Wally’s grinning face on the other side, “or that Batman has finally, _finally_ , cracked a smile. Anything else is not worth my time.”

“It’s neither of those things,” Wally chirped, and then immediately used his super speed to jam a foot in the door before he could slam it, “it’s something far more important. Diana told me you had a _date_ last night.”

He stared for a moment, and then shook his head. For being supposedly the premiere superhero team on earth, the Justice League really could seem like a coalition of helpless gossips a lot of the time, “yes, Wally, I did. And that was meant to be a _private_ piece of information, shared between two people only.”

“But I’m your best friend!”

“ _Exactly_ my point.”

Wally huffed, but couldn’t hold back a beam for long. That was, perhaps, the main factor in their friendship lasting for so long – Wally was a ray of sunshine that you’d have to be utterly evil to take permanently against, “okay, fine, I forgive you. How was it? Where did you take him? Was it awkward? Did you kiss him goodnight, or-?”

Irredeemable gossips. He sighed lowly, knowing that anything he said would immediately be carried back to the rest of the eagerly waiting league, “Wally…”

“-Just settle for a handshake? Or-“ but apparently he didn’t need to worry about silencing Wally’s prattle with a firm construct and heading back to bed. Because, before he could fully consider the many benefits of such an action, Wally’s jaw had already dropped open and his eyes had gone glassily wide, “whoa.”

“You must be John’s weirdly fast friend,” Sam’s voice said cheerfully from behind him, followed by only the slightest yawn, “nice to meet you. John, do you keep your cereal in the cupboards or the fridge?”

“Cupboards,” he provided, turning over his shoulder to give the shirtless Sam a brief smile, “second one on the left, the shelf below the biscuits.”

“Sensible man.”

“…So,” Wally finally managed, as Sam shuffled into the kitchen and he turned slowly back to gauge the man’s – frankly hilarious looking – face, “on the first date, huh?”

“ _Goodbye_ , Wally.”

“Hey-!”

But he’d already cheerfully shut the door, and padded happily into the kitchen after Sam to claim a good morning kiss.


End file.
